


Summer Days

by shennyjohn12



Series: The Malcolm Docs [1]
Category: Malcolm in the Middle
Genre: ADHD Francis, ADHD Reese, Aroace Malcolm, Autistic Malcolm, Autistic Reese, Coming Out, Everyone is clearly neurodivergent, Gay Reese, ND characters, Queer Character, Reese centric, Reese coming out story, The will be NO incest that’s super gross wtf is wrong with y’all, bi francis, supportive brothers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-10
Updated: 2021-03-10
Packaged: 2021-03-16 17:41:00
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,442
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29953551
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shennyjohn12/pseuds/shennyjohn12
Summary: Reese comes to a realization as summer begins, and this is his little adventure of figuring it out and coming out to his family members.
Series: The Malcolm Docs [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2202993
Kudos: 4





	Summer Days

**Author's Note:**

> If you didn’t read the tag, in my fic everyone is ND. I think it’s basically canon, but here are some terms you may need to know to understand some parts. 
> 
> Masking is acting neurotypical. Normally it’s a trauma response and is subconscious a lot of the time.  
> Scripting is when you have a conversation layout memorized. It can be from simple conversations to even memorizing movies worth of script. 
> 
> I’m not the best at explain, but I think that’s it.

No matter how Reese looked at the matter there was only one daunting answer for all of his problems. Why he loved girls, but being near them made him sabotage himself or get so nervous he would have to laugh constantly to hide his panicked breathing. How he never understood what other guys meant when they talked about wanting to go all the way with their girlfriends before they were even out of high school. How his heart got all floaty around the other boy in his weekend pastry class. Sometimes to the point he would lose the spoons to talk about anything but his special interests until he’d be asked to quiet down by the instructor. Maybe that wouldn’t mean anything if he didn’t catch himself thinking that he’s gay whenever someone in his class started talking about girls. Or like when he told the one girl at their dad’s company picnic without thinking. Or how he felt like everything he said he liked about girls were just things he quoted from crappy cable shows. Probably another subconscious masking thing or whatever Malcolm calls it. But it all meant one thing, and he didn’t know how ready he was to handle the idea. 

=•=

“Reese, what are you doing?” Lois asked, interrupting her son’s thoughts as he idly played with a box of matches. He let out a small ‘huh’ before she snatched them from his hands. “ I told you not to play with fire, now go help your brothers clean the house. Francis is coming home for the summer and I won’t have this house turning into a rats nest while your father and I are working during the day.” 

“Fine,” he said, hopping off of the washer and turning the corner into the bedroom. It’s not like the house isn’t already one. He heard his mom add something else but his brain didn’t have the energy to listen. Malcolm and Dewey were just starting to clean their room when he came in and got to work, not having the mental capacity to bully his brothers while having an identity crisis. 

After a few minutes Malcolm started mumbling to himself like always. It was hard to tell what he was ever talking about, but most of it seemed like he was having some monologue about what he was doing. Normally it would get on Reese’s nerves, but he was too zoned out to notice. 

Once he finished tidying the closet, Reese walked out to the kitchen and started cleaning, without having to be told. Malcolm noticed and peeked his head out of their room to stare before their mom came by and gave him a new task. The night continued almost soundlessly, while everyone got increasingly concerned by Reese’s eerie silence. Lois and Hal thought he was up to something and the boys were fearful he was planning revenge on their latest prank. 

Once the house was mostly clean Lois started dinner, seeing as Reese was busy with the fireplace. Not that he would have heard being asked to start preparing the meal. “Hal, something is up with that boy,” she whispered, throwing a glance over to the kid with frosted tips. “He’s never this quiet unless something big happened. I need you to find out what he did and report back to me.” Hal nodded and made his way over to his second oldest son. 

“Hello, Reese.” Hal squatted down to talk face to face. 

“Hey, Dad.” 

“Your mother and I are a bit concerned about you. You’ve been silent all night. Is there anything you want to tell us?” Reese shook his head with the worried face he always gets when he is caught doing something, so Hal continues. “If you tell me what you did, maybe I can help.” He suggested, trying to get Reese to look back at him after he was refocused on cleaning the last bits of soot off of the bricks. “Reese?”

“All done!” He yelled, gathering the supplies and rushing to his room with a hasty goodnight.

“I knew he was hiding something. Why can’t our kids just stay out of trouble for one day? That’s all I ask.” 

=•=

After another week of contemplating, Reese realized he was, most likely, gay. Considering when he tried to think of being with a girl he almost threw up his lunch. He made a plan on how to navigate the topic, and actually remembered it after the thought crossed his mind. First he would talk to Malcolm about it. The genius kid was better at sorting out things than he was, though it would be extremely embarrassing. But the only other option was to ask Francis and while his older brother is understanding, he’d definitely run away from having a heart to heart about more than protecting each other. So, he’d ask Malcolm while Mom and Dad were picking Francis up from the airport. 

“Hey, Malcolm. You’re smart right?” The brunet rolled his eyes and nodded. “Well, I have something I need help with and I feel like you’d probably be the best help.”

“Crap, you didn’t kill someone did you!”

“No!”

“Oh. Okay.” Malcolm paused sitting more comfortably on his bed to look at Reese. Dewey was out in the garage practicing piano, so Reese wasn’t too worried about him overhearing and blabbing their conversation to anyone. “Well, what is it?”

“I have something I’ve been thinking about lately, but I’m not 100% sure yet. And I thought since you’re super smart, maybe you could just tell me what to do. That way I don’t have to think about it anymore.” Malcolm nodded,with a short okay. Reese took a breath and let his eyes flick down to his hands while he played with a loose thread on his jeans. “I think that maybe I’m probably, well…”

“Probably what?”

“Gay.”

“Really?” Reese nodded. “Okay, well how am I supposed to help?”

“I don’t know. You’re the smart one, I thought you could tell me how to handle it.” Reese said, looking back at his younger brother. “Like, how do I stop masking it. Cause like I realized I’m just repeating tv quotes. Or how do I tell people? Stuff like that. Advice.”

“Well, the masking part is just how I always tell you. Recognize the behavior you’re doing to fit in and try to figure out what you actually want to do. Like how you used to force yourself to make eye contact , and then you stopped once I told you that’s why you were so burnt out.” Reese nodded again and readjusted how he was sitting. “It’s just scripting, so just try to make new responses in your head to replace them? That might help.”

“I’ll keep that in mind.”

“And you just told me, so that’s a start.”

“I guess you’re right.” Reese sighed, and relaxed his shoulders. 

“And um, if we’re talking about this sort of stuff. I’m aroace, so yeah.” 

“What’s that mean?”

“It’s, like, no ‘attraction’ to anyone. Like boys, girls, or anyone else.” Malcolm explained, trying to simplify the idea for his brother. 

“Cool. Are all smart people like that? Is that why all of the other Krelboynes are single?” Malcolm chuckled a little bit and shook his head. Reese joined in soon enough until they both heard the car pull into the driveway. 

“Francis!”

=•=

“I’m so glad you’re back Francis, life totally sucked without you.” 

“Yeah. It’s been horrible without you. Mom won’t get off our back at all while you’re gone. It’s like she has an extra kids worth of punishment ideas stored away.” 

“Well I’m happy to be back. I missed you guys so much.”

“You’re the best Francis.” 

=•=

“So, Reese. How have you been?” Francis asked, laying down on their bed and twiddling with some fidget cube he found in Malcolm’s desk. 

“Pretty good. Mom and Dad have been letting me take baking and pastry classes down at the rec center since I raised all of my grades above failing.” Reese explained, using his hands for emphasis at how fun the class has been. “And this time we are learning how to work in actual bakeries. And my partner isn’t some idiot old lady, so we’re the best in the class. As it should be.”

“That’s cool. I didn’t know you like baking that much.” Francis smiled, letting his brother continue to infodump about his class before noticing how much he seemed to appreciate his class partner. Or well, more than appreciate. 

“And then, we went over different icing techniques, but since I was super bouncy that day Sam did all of the work and it was like the best looking cake ever. It had this cool lace icing~”

“So, who is this Sam anyway?” The blond asked, sitting up to face Reese with one of his knowing smirks. Reese looked like a blushing mess just standing there, while trying to remember what all he said in the past twenty minutes. “Is she your girlfriend?”

“What! No, ew! Just leave me alone.” Reese yelled at the blond. Francis laughed and rolled his eyes before flopping back down on the bed.

“You sooo have a crush on her.” He teased. 

“Impossible, I can’t have a crush on her, because Sam isn’t even a her…” he trailed off, seeing Francis turn to look back at him curiously, “so ha. Take that.” He said quietly, starting to shake his left leg nervously out of habit. The silence was awkward and Reese couldn’t help but just stand there, trying to calm down. He wasn’t exactly expecting to come out to Francis anytime soon, and if he didn’t change the topic soon he felt like that’s what was going to happen. “And, then this week.. was, uh, macaroon week so..”

“Hey, are you okay?” Francis asked, making eye contact with his little brother to add a bit of emphasis. “Here, sit down.” He patted a spot beside himself while he moved to a sitting position. Reese sighed and settled in beside his brother, with his leg still bouncing. “You know it’s okay to have crushes on not ‘her’s’ right?” Francis asked, cringing at his phrasing. 

“Yeah.” 

“Okay, good.” The blond nodded, looking around the room in search of what to say next. “So, do you like this Sam?” 

The spikey-haired teen nodded softly. The two remained wordless for a moment while Reese started to feel less panicked. He finally managed to squeak out a small ‘yes.’ Francis gave him a small smile before ruffling his hair. “Stop that, it took me forever to get my hair right today.” 

“Right, I wouldn't want you to be caught looking bad in front of Sam.” He laughed as Reese shoved him off. 

“I’m gay.” 

“That’s awesome, Reese. Thanks for telling me.” 

=•=

“Boys! Get over here right now!” Lois yelled from the front door, sounding more furious than she had been since summer started. Quickly, the four boys rushed to try and escape only to be stopped before they got to the kitchen door. “What the hell have you been up to today?”

“Nothing, we swear. We just went and played street hockey up by the Miller’s.” Malcolm defended, looking around to his brothers for some back up. 

“Oh, so you admit you were at the scene of the crime.” Their mom said, crossing her arms against the pale blue work uniform. 

“What crime scene? We didn’t do anything besides play hockey. I swear!” Francis said, holding a threatening staring contest with Lois. “You’re always blaming us for everything.”

“Yeah. We didn’t do anything wrong today.” Reese added, looking proud of himself. 

“Well, somebody told me one of my boys the pride flag off of the church this afternoon, just two blocks away from the Miller’s.” She said, examining their faces. Malcolm and Dewey both couldn’t help but throw a quick glance to Reese, Francis kept glaring at the woman in front of them. “Ah, so you’re the culprit.” 

“I swear Mom, it wasn’t me. What good would I have with that piece of junk.” Reese stated, but let his eyes glance everywhere but at his mom. His case was not looking good. 

“Mom, I know this looks bad but we didn’t do it. Reese was with us all day.” Malcolm tried to say, but his voice was lacking any confidence. 

“We’ll see about that.” There was a pause as she gave the boys another hard stare. “You’re father is going to be so disappointed in you all. Behaviors like this hurt people, you know. Everyone is going to think I raised you boys to be like this. Reese, you better go get that flag and take it back right now and apologize.” 

“But I didn’t take it. I swear Mom. For once in my life I didn’t do it.” 

“Mom, Reese is telling the truth.” 

“Shut it, Dewey. Let me deal with this.” 

“But I took it.” 

“You what!” Lois screamed. Now even her youngest was causing havoc around the neighborhood. “Why would you do something like that? People get hurt by actions like these. Some people have to fight tooth and nail just to be treated equally. You can’t just do things like that Dewey.”

“I’m sorry I just heard Francis and Reese talking the other day and thought I could give~”

“Dewey, you better zip it if you know what’s good for you.” Reese grabbed Dewey by the front of his shirt before being pulled off of the little kid by his mother. The blond boy looked frightened and quickly shut his mouth. Lois put Reese so he was facing her while the other three just stood silently. 

“Now Dewey, what did~”

“I’m bi. Dewey must have heard me telling Reese about my ex, Stanley and thought he could give it to me as a present.” Francis stated, putting an arm between his mom and his brothers. “He’s just a kid, he probably didn’t think at all.” 

“Oh. Well, still you boys need to go down and apologize. Now!” She said, giving a stern look to the younger three siblings. She was obviously still mad, but a wave of relief also seemed to wash over her. There was a series of frustrated ‘yes mom’s from the group as Dewey went to grab his backpack. 

“Let’s go,” Francis said when the four were back in a group. 

“Francis, you can stay here. Let’s have a little talk.”

“About what? I did nothing wrong.” 

“I know that, we just need to talk about the birds and the bees again. Or well, I guess this time just the birds” Lois explained, grabbing Francis’ arm and sitting him down at the table. 

“Wait, no. I should go and apologize with them. Who knows what they’ll do without an adult with them.” Francis said, before continuing, “I already had the talk with you. It was the worst day of my life.” 

“Oh, calm down sweetie. You went to military school, I’m sure you heard half of this stuff before.”

“Thanks, Francis.” Reese whispered as the other three Wilkerson kids left the house, before snickering at him through the kitchen window. 

=•=

“Malcolm.” Reese greeted as he punched the boy in the shoulder. “What are you doing?” 

“Reading.” The brunet stated, looking over to where Reese was rummaging through their bin of old toys. 

“What’s it about?” He asked, laying down on the bed so he was dangling over the side of his bed. 

“It’s this story about~”

“That’s cool,” Reese interrupted. “Do you think I should ask Sam out?” 

“Who’s Sam?” 

“My partner in the baking class I go to. I think he likes me back. Like whenever I talk to him he’s nice to me and he laughs at my jokes.” He explained. 

“Reese, I don’t know. That sounds like regular friend things. Has he ever tried to flirt with you? Or is he nice to you outside of class?”

“See, I don’t know. I’m really bad at reading subtext, remember? But I'm sure he likes me, I mean I’m the best chef in the class and I’m totally cool.”

“I guess, just don’t cry to me if he says no.”

“Alright.”

=•=

“I can’t believe you’d get in a fight at your pastry class, Reese! I thought they were helping you become a better person.” Lois screamed while she led Reese into the house by his ear. 

“Mom, I swear, it’s not my fault. He started it.” 

“How did a sweet boy like Sam start a fight, he wears glasses for crying out loud. You need to learn some respect, mister.” Lectured Lois while she let go of Reese’s ear to stand in front of him. Hal didn’t really know what to do in these types of situations besides back up his wife, so that’s what he did. “You know, they may not let you come back after this. For now it’s just this round of classes but they could decide to ban you for good. Tomorrow you’re going to get all dressed up and apologize to your instructor and hope she lets you keep taking those classes.”

“But I didn’t start it! I was just defending myself.”

“Defending yourself from what, he’s got no muscles Reese.”

“He was calling me names.”

“What kind of names?” Lois asked, suddenly more concerned about her boy than the other kid. 

“It’s embarrassing, I don’t want to say it.”

“Fine, but you’re still grounded. Even if he did call you names you were at the one place you promised us your absolute best behavior. Now go, we’ll talk about this in the morning.” 

=•=

A few weeks passed and it was halfway through summer break. Everyone but Lois and Hal knew Reese was gay. Hell, Reese even came out to Stevie when he tried to talk about girls with him after Malcolm refused to give much of an opinion on the girls in their class. So, his last goal for the summer was to come out to his parents before the school year started, and maybe get up to some trouble. He didn’t really know how he was going to do it, but he decided doing it over dinner would be best. Meals in their house were already so chaotic that it wouldn’t feel like any pressure. And his brothers would be there to help him along. 

“Hey, Mom. What are we doing for dinner tonight?” Reese asked, bouncing his knee under the table while playing cards with his brothers. “I can make something if you want?

“No, it’s too hot today to use the oven. Maybe we can order pizza. And I think we have some ice cream in the freezer if you guys are good for the rest of the day.” Lois replied. 

“Cool, thanks Mom.” He said smiling. 

“Why are you being so nice. What did you do?”

“Nothing.. well that I can remember.” Maybe accidentally burning the siding of the house by the window while playing with matches was something, but he didn’t really remember. So, that didn’t count. 

“Alright. I’ll put in the order now.” She said walking back to the couch to sit by Hal while they watched some cheesy scary movie.

The afternoon carried in calmly until the pizza delivery arrived and the boys had to clear their game off the table. Much to Dewey’s protest. It didn’t matter anyway, Malcolm always won. 

“So boys, anything new happening lately?” Hal asked before pouring everyone a glass of his sweet tea. 

“Actually, yeah.” Reese paused, waiting for his parents attention. “I, um, having something to tell you guys.” Francis and Malcolm looked between their brother and their parents, probably predicting what it was about. Dewey, on the other hand, kept his focus on his food. Reese started to bounce his leg to focus his thoughts together. Normally by bjs his family would have trailed the conversation to another topic, but he assumed Francis and Malcolm were the cause. 

“Reese?” 

“Oh right,” he paused, taking a sip of his tea, “I just wanted to tell that, well, I’m gay.” He said, looking up to his family. Francis was smiling at him while everyone else seemed to be catching up. Well Malcolm was probably just zoned into his inner monologue. 

“Good for you Reese.” Hal replied, reaching over to pat his son gently on the back and showing one of his goofy smiles. Lois also smiled from across the table, it wasn’t like there was much else to say. 

“Yeah, Reese that’s great.” Says Dewey before taking another piece of pizza from the box. 

“Hey, when did it become seconds!” And then chaos broke out again.


End file.
